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I always liked Rene Levesque and detested Parizeau. I never thought of Levesque as racist or anti-semitic but in the rank & file is was pervasive. Just the fact that Parizeau's "anglos & ethnics" got applause speaks volumes.
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Well, I was watching it live in the original "floor" sound which was in French. It only got a smattering of claps and also a smattering of jeers. I think most people were just shocked.
I was personally shocked too, not so much by the statement but by the fact that he actually said it.
For the record it was not directed at Jews in particular but to all groups whose leadership said very publically and emphatically: "All Jews MUST vote NO", "All Italians MUST vote NO", "All Greeks MUST vote NO", "All Klingons MUST vote NO".
This is probably the 100th time I've said this on an online forum, but even if it was a very unstatesmanlike thing to say, I find it a bit rich for people to go all apoplectic on him for saying it when it was the groups themselves who first called on their "people" to vote "ethnically" in the referendum...
I remember the Quebexodus (love that expression, BTW).
Most of the people I used to know when I was younger have bolted, but I still have a friend or two, and several acquaintances who don't want to leave Quebec.
Well, I was watching it live in the original "floor" sound which was in French. It only got a smattering of claps and also a smattering of jeers. I think most people were just shocked.
Note for foreign readers: there is a subset of the Canadian population for whom any person associated with the Quebec independence movement can never have any redeeming qualities. Much less be given the benefit of the doubt.
Knowing this fact is quite useful when reading any discussion on the topic.
I actually sympathized to some extent with the separatists in 1970s Quebec. For example, to get a well paying job in Montreal at the time, knowledge of English was often necessary.
I was not a fan of Jacques Parizeau as he gave me the creeps but he was a highly intelligent man.
He is vilified in anglo circles all across Canada and "Parizeau = racist" is basically a truism even in polite company, but one thing many people don't know is that his wife of 30 years and mother of his children was a concentration camp survivor by the name of Alicja (Alice) Poznanska. I don't believe she was Jewish but she was involved the Warsaw Uprising in 1944 (when she was only 13-14) and her father died in a concentration camp.
I suppose most people who hate his guts don't care but this is still all true.
I don't think he was personally anti-Semitic. But I'm saying when you talk about money and "ethnics" it sounds like coded anti-Semitism.
I wouldn't say the separatist movement is racist. I know plenty of people that are separatist that are not racist, Some of the nicest people I met while living in Quebec were separatist. Also, I knew a lot Haitians and Arabs that were open supporters of the separatist movement.
For the record it was not directed at Jews in particular but to all groups whose leadership said very publically and emphatically: "All Jews MUST vote NO", "All Italians MUST vote NO", "All Greeks MUST vote NO", "All Klingons MUST vote NO".
This is probably the 100th time I've said this on an online forum, but even if it was a very unstatesmanlike thing to say, I find it a bit rich for people to go all apoplectic on him for saying it when it was the groups themselves who first called on their "people" to vote "ethnically" in the referendum...
Why is there such a disconnect in thinking so as to prevent Parizeau, and now you, seeing the irony in your castigating people for "bloc" voting along ethnic lines when the whole sovereignty movement could be said to have as it's primary motivation, that very premise?
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